Nor aught of mutual joy or sorrow knew,
Until their spirits mingled in the sea
That to itself takes all—Eternity.”
The trout and grayling fishing in the Derwent here is of excellent quality, the water being stocked and preserved by zealous local angling societies, supported by the Trent Conservancy Board.
MATLOCK BATH.
After leaving Darley the wooded banks contract, and the hills press forward, and at Matlock, nine-and-twenty miles from Barrow Stones, the stream runs through a deep gorge, where limestone precipices, festooned with foliage, rise sheer from the water’s edge. This romantic ravine, overtopped by higher hills, extends for about three miles. Matlock is a misleading title. The little town is only a small watering-place, but it is split up into several principalities, governed by two Local Boards, and known as Matlock Bath, Matlock Bridge, Matlock Bank, Matlock Town, Matlock Cliff, and Matlock Green. There are two railway stations, the Bridge and the Bath, a mile apart; but passengers wishful to get to the one place find themselves alighting at the other, and the divisions and sub-divisions are most confusing. Matlock Bank (for which the Bridge is the station, distant a quarter of a mile) is given up to hydropathic establishments, of which there is a colony. Here John Smedley introduced the cold-water treatment many years ago, and the building devoted to his system of cure has developed into one of colossal proportions. Between Matlock Bridge and Matlock Bath the High Tor intervenes, occupying nearly the whole distance. It is a most impressive example of rock scenery, rising in one perpendicular face of grim grey limestone, 400 feet above the Derwent, which brawls angrily over the rocky bed at its stupendous base. The Midland main line perforates this mighty mass, and the dull roar of the trains may be heard reverberating in the gloomy tunnel with strange echoing resonance. There are natural fissures in the rock abounding in dog-tooth crystals, fluor-spar, lead-ore, and other minerals, and at the summit of the giddy cliff are pleasure-grounds. More than one disastrous accident has occurred through people venturing too near the edge and falling into the abyss beneath. Matlock Bath is a continuation of the poetic gorge, the Derwent being almost enclosed on the right by the towering Heights of Masson (commonly called the “Heights of Abraham”), and on the left by the Lovers’ Walks. For about a mile the stream is deep and stately, and lends itself admirably to boating. Matlock Bath is a favourite resort of cheap trippers, who find innocent enjoyment in climbing the hills, exploring the caverns, investing their coppers at the petrifying wells, and driving to the Via Gellia, a charming valley within easy distance. The Pavilion is a large modern building standing on a terrace under the Dungeon Tors, and commanding panoramic views of great extent and variety. The Bath is also a much-frequented resort, and contains hotels that favourably compare with the caravansaries of other fashionable watering-places. The New Bath Hotel stands on the site of the old hotel, where Lord Byron met Mary Chaworth, and the lime-tree under which the poet sat with the proud beauty still flourishes. This tree has weathered the storms of more than three hundred winters, and is a marvel of arboreal growth, its wide-spreading branches covering an area of 350 square feet. Byron was a frequent visitor to Matlock, and in one of his letters to Thomas Moore he declares “there are prospects in Derbyshire as noble as in Greece or Switzerland.” Mr. Ruskin visits the New Bath Hotel, and the author of “Modern Painters” writes in a characteristic manner:—“Speaking still wholly for myself, as an Epicurean Anchorite and Monastic Misanthrope, I pray leave to submit, as a deeply oppressed and afflicted Brother of that Order, that I can’t find anything like Derbyshire anywhere else. ‘J’ai beau,’ as our polite neighbours untranslateably express it, to scale the precipices of the Wengern Alp with Manfred, to penetrate with Faust the defiles of the Brocken—the painlessly accessible turrets of Matlock High Tor, the guiltlessly traceable Lovers’ Walks by the Derwent, have for me still more attractive peril and a dearer witchery. Looking back to my past life I find, though not without surprise, that it owes more to the Via Gellia than the Via Mala, to the dripping wells of Matlock than the dust-rain of Lauterbrunnen.”
Leaving Matlock Bath, the Derwent is utilised for commercial purposes by the Arkwrights, in connection with their mill machinery, and a very dangerous weir is the bête noir of the oarsman. Cromford, the cradle of the cotton manufacture, follows. Here are the immense but cleanly factories founded by Sir Richard Arkwright, the Preston barber’s apprentice; and here is Willersley Castle, the seat of the family whose fortunes he made, looking down from a natural rocky plateau, embowered in trees, upon the windings of the river. Cromford bridge is a curious old structure. The arches on one side are pointed Gothic in style, and on the other side they are of a semicircular character. The same incongruity in architecture is to be observed in the bridges at Matlock Town and Darley. This is to be accounted for by the fact that they were once pack-saddle structures, and have been widened with no regard to the preservation of uniformity.
MARKEATON BRIDGE.